Product Description

The 8 million fans of TLC’s hottest show, What Not to Wear, know it as the place to go for real-life fashion advice. Now the show’s hosts, Clinton Kelly and Stacy London, offer spot-on fashion wisdom—with an attitude—in this fully illustrated, authoritative, and irreverent fashion guide to dressing your best for every occasion. Clinton and Stacy’s surefire method for boosting appearance rests on their belief that we can all win admiring glances by selecting clothes that play up our positives and create a balanced body shape. In Dress Your Best, Clinton and Stacy match a wide range of female and male body types with the perfect work, casual, and evening attire, showing you exactly how to make your best parts “work” for you.

Dressing tips for 26 body types!
Features 18 women and 8 men: bigger on top, bigger on bottom, a little extra in the middle, not curvy, extra curvy, small-framed, athletic, and more!

Whether you’re searching for a way to accentuate your assets, puzzling over the right print pattern for your frame, or just looking for a solution to the dilemma “What do I need to wear to look fabulous?” you’ll find here the universal tips, dos and don’ts, seasonal alternatives, and must-haves that will deliver the answers. Dress Your Best is certain to become the standard by which all other fashion guides are measured.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #13276 in Books
• Published on: 2005-09-13
• Released on: 2005-09-13
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

From Publishers Weekly
The spunky hosts of TLC's What to Wear present a fashion guide that's empowering, friendly and exceedingly useful. No gimmicky, fruit-related body shape names here—Kelly and London keep things simple. For each of their female body types—"bigger on top," "bigger on the bottom," "a little extra in the middle," "curvy," "not curvy," etc.—there's advice for petite, average height and tall women. (The men's section is equally straightforward if shorter: "tall," "athletic," "barrel-chested," etc.) Kelly and London use positive reinforcement (there are many more "dos" than "don'ts"), and sprinkle "universal tips" applicable to any body type throughout. Each type's section opens with a photo of an average-looking model sporting a basic swimsuit, along with comments from the model and the authors. Although they don't cite brand or store names, Kelly and London give plenty of specific advice: e.g., a straight dress will accentuate curves on an hourglass shape; a jacket with a moderately low "stance" (v-neck) will help the upper body appear longer. Ladies and gentlemen, start your shopping engines—and don't leave home without this book!
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
The sweet yet knowledgeable and even assertive fashionistas who are the hosts of the hit cable TV show What Not to Wear set their precepts down in print in this delightfully upbeat and decidedly informative primer for both men and women. Their firm, understandable, and workable advice is underscored by their desire not to change anyone's body type--no preaching about dieting here--but simply to get people to understand their own body types and dress appropriately for the best effect. Kelly and London take 15 real women and 8 real men as "subjects," representing all types of bodies, from "bigger on top" to "barrel-chested," and with both illustrations and text, they suggest, for each subject, three outfits to wear for work, weekend, and evening. This book should be regarded as fun reading, not as a chore; the authors' approach to fashion is not as an arcane code capable of being grasped only by certain enlightened people. In their hands, fashion is not only about looking good but also about having a good time while doing so. Brad Hooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
“Ladies and gentlemen, start your shopping engines . . . and don’t leave home without this book. Empowering, friendly, and exceedingly useful.” —Publishers Weekly

Customer Reviews

Dress Your Best
I liked this book the first time I read it, and liked it more when I reread the sections that most applied to me. It's packed with concise observations and recommendations, delivered in a friendly, humorous, vibrant style. I haven't seen any other books for men that address the obvious differences in men's bodies and what works best on those who are short, tall, barrel-chested, big-waisted, etc. etc. At most there is a paragraph or two; most of the advice only applies to average height slim men. I found that several of the types applied to me most directly; but "universal tips" are found throughout the section for men, so all of it is worth reading. Some of the tips in the section for women also apply to men. I would actually like Clinton and Stacy to write another book organized differently, in which they could systematically take up questions like "what colors go together?" (for the clueless newbies among us) and color theory more generally, color considerations and skin tone, different kinds of fabrics, and just clothing issues thematically.

One thing I've noticed in the several books I have read on style is how often an author contradicts himself or lays down rules that other authors contradict, or just generally states rules without much rationale that seem really idiosyncratic to me. I didn't see a single statment in Clinton and Stacy's book that fell down in this regard, and that's high praise.

This book made a difference!
Great book! Not only do you get information on how to dress your own particular body shape, but the book is filled with "universal tips" in every section. Also included is a list of items for properly stocking your closet... for both women and men. For those who need just a little help and for those who don't have a clue, this is a great buy!

What NOT To Buy...This Book!
I am an avid watcher of the weekly television show What Not To Wear, so when I saw this book, I added it to my Amazon wishlist. I finally got around to buying it last week, and I am about to leave my desk right now to ship it back.

Although the advice is sound, the entire book only had 3 pages relevant to me. I'm sorry, but I'm not paying $16 for a book that I can only read/use 3 pages of.

I was able to find my body type, which is not curvy, average height, and it included some good tips about fit for my body type...but the rest of the book was useless to me.

I thought the book was going to be about putting together a look, and how to shop for specific items, but it wasn't.

My recommendation to anyone who is looking for a book about style and how to put together looks is this...don't buy this book, buy The Lucky Shopping Manual: Building and Improving Your Wardrobe Piece by Piece, which actually has tons and tons of great advice for how to develop your style and what items you need, etc. They also have another great book coming out in Oct. called The Lucky Guide to Mastering Any Style: Creating Iconic Looks and Making Them Your Own, which has information about how to put together the 10 most popular fashion styles (rock and roll, bohemian, etc)...now THAT book I can't wait to buy, and I know it will be worth every penny.